Justinian an Anastasius?

Anastasius I is a thoroughly underappreciated Byzantine Emperor. During his reign, he enriched the treasury by 23,000,000 solidi, and fortified much of the remaining frontier. What if Justinian, rather than squandering all of this significant wealth, was another Anastasius, of sorts, and worked to enrich the Empire financially.

IOTL, he did work out many of the kinks in the legal and taxation system, with the help of his truly singular advisors, but what if, in addition to this, he left the Byzantine Empire, rather than overextended in Italy, (I'm arguing that Sicily and the former Vandal Kingdom could have been the extent of his conquests) he left the Empire with a full treasury, rather than the empty one he left IOTL.

And yes, I'm leaving out poor neglected Justin, but I'm regarding him as largely an extension of Justinian for this scenario, due to their similar policies, and Justinian's dominance during the reign of Justin.
 
1) you bump after 1 hour and 7 minutes!?!?! Most of us aren't on 24/7, you know.

2) Justinian had lots of problems. Massively overspending was one. Not supporting Belisarius properly was another.

But the real problem was the Plague that occurred. That really knocked back the whole empire. Justinian could have been as responsible as all get out, and the Empire would still have gone through tough times afterwards.


Justinian being careful means no Hagia Sophia, which would have been a huge loss to the world.

But, yes, trying to reconquer all of Italy, especially the way he did it, was a real overstretch.
 
Although with no reconquest of Africa and Sicily, where does the Empire recover from during the Persian Wars?
 
Justinian was fundamentally an opportunist, intervening in the West as and when the right combination of factors occurred. Have the Ostrogothic Queen Amalasuntha (daughter of Theodoric) be a little more politically adept and avoid deposition, and you can avoid the Italian war. In any case, the problem with Italy was that Justinian spent too little in the peninsula, not too much. Had considerably more resources been invested in Italy, then the war would've been won much more quickly.

The plague (or something in the 540s anyway) obviously badly knocked the Empire sideways, and the rest of Justinian's reign was spent playing catchup. Nonetheless, it should be remembered that there was enough of a surplus in the 570s for Tiberius II to both be noted as an extravagant spender and to keep the frontiers broadly stable. About the plague, I add the caveat in Whittow's book that no archaeologist of the Eastern Mediterranean has ever discovered a sixth century plague pit...

EDIT- Although Whittow was writing a good fifteen years ago now, so I suspect the archaeology has moved on considerably now. Does anyone know if sixth century plague pits for the Eastern Med. have been excavated yet?
 
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Although with no reconquest of Africa and Sicily, where does the Empire recover from during the Persian Wars?

I think the OP posists those conquests remain, but Italy (where most of the Byzantine wealth was squandered and which was lost to invading Lombards a few years later anyway) is not fought over:

Opening Post said:
(I'm arguing that Sicily and the former Vandal Kingdom could have been the extent of his conquests)

The Italian War was IMO a huge waste of resources for the Empire and without it, it is definately stronger. Probably Belisarius and his troops are employed on the Persian Front, where they perform most likely better than the OTL campaign, possibly butterflying away the Persian War a few decades later.
 
One detail often forgotten is that internal strife enabled Justinian to retake a third of Spain with a minimal force so if not bogged down in Italy it might be the Visigoths and even the Suebi who are restored to the empire.
 
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